MLBB 2026: the new heroes Marcel, Hirara and Sora

2026 is a pivotal year for Mobile Legends: Bang Bang: Moonton has crossed the threshold of 133 playable heroes and is already preparing the arrival of the 134th. After a busy 2025 season, the studio has kept up its usual pace, slipping in a new character every ten to fourteen weeks, between each major seasonal update.

Two heroes have officially joined the Land of Dawn since January 2026: Marcel in March, then Hirara in June. Add to that Sora, who arrived on December 18, 2025 just before the year changeover, whose meta only stabilized in January-February, as well as Collie, the future hero 134 unveiled on the Advance Server and expected in the coming weeks. Here's the complete guide to understanding where each one stands in the current meta of patch 2.1.90.

Quick reminder: MLBB heroes keep their official English name in the French client. No translation for Marcel, Hirara, Sora, or Collie — so we'll keep the EN names throughout this guide.

Marcel, the Soul Photographer (March 11, 2026)

Marcel is the 132nd hero of the roster and the face of Season 40: Decisive Moment. Officially launched on March 11, 2026, he brings a completely new mechanic to MLBB: temporal stasis. Classified as Support in the database, his gameplay actually pushes him toward a hybrid initiator/tank role that controls the tempo of teamfights more than it heals allies.

Role and positioning

Marcel is a pure roamer. He plays the Roam Lane, sticks close to his carry in the early game, then rotates aggressively around the Turtle and the side lanes. He's not a heal-bot like Rafaela or Estes: he lives for engaging fights and cutting off enemy rotations.

Main abilities

• Passive — Platinum Snap: Clemar (his camera) automatically photographs nearby enemy heroes, applying a brief immobilize and dealing true damage based on the target's max HP. Marcel and a nearby ally gain a shield equal to the damage dealt.
• Skill 1 — Framed Moment: Marcel places a frame in an area, which after a short delay deals damage and immobilizes enemies inside it. The damage scales with his defense, which encourages a tank build.
• Skill 2 — Tracking Shot: Marcel gains a burst of speed (up to +75% when moving toward an enemy), then can recast to dash and leave a ghost behind at his original position.
• Ultimate — Golden Hour: creates a stasis field for 3 seconds. Everything that enters it — heroes, projectiles, minions, turrets, even the Lord — is frozen. Only Marcel can deal damage during this time. This is the game's first true time-stop.

Recommended item build

Marcel is played exclusively tanky. The standard order, proven in soloq:

1. Roam Boots with the Encourage blessing
2. Dominance Ice (against high-attack-speed carries)
3. Athena's Shield or Oracle depending on the enemy mage duo
4. Antique Cuirass
5. Immortality
6. Brute Force Breastplate or Guardian Helmet in the last slot

Emblem: Tank, with Vitality, Tenacity, and Brave Smite. Battle spell: Flicker, nearly mandatory for lining up the ultimate out of the fog of war.

Key matchups

Marcel crushes compositions that need space to cast: long-channel mages like Pharsa or Vale get literally frozen before their ult. He is, however, vulnerable to classic anti-tanks (Karrie, Baxia) and to multi-charge dashers who can get out of his Golden Hour before it closes (Fanny, Ling).

Hirara, the Fallen Scarlet (June 17, 2026)

Hirara is the game's 133rd hero and the face of Season 41: Scarlet Embers. She was released on June 17, 2026 with patch 2.1.90. She is a totally atypical assassin: only two skills, no ultimate in the classic sense, and a unique resource called Crimson/Death Energy.

Role and positioning

Hirara is a pure jungler. She refuses side roles and needs Retribution gold to hit her power spike around her second item. Her gameplay resembles a Karina/Selena mix: she hunts isolated targets, but doesn't have a true one-shot. She applies two distinct marks — Crimson via Kaerazu, Death via Meisen-e — and when both meet on the same target, that target is briefly frozen. That's the only window where her damage is guaranteed.

Main abilities

• Passive: manages the Crimson/Death Energy resource (2 stacks max), which is spent to cast a merged version of her two skills.
• Skill 1 — Kaerazu: throws her first fan, applies a Crimson mark and deals damage.
• Skill 2 — Meisen-e: throws her second fan, applies the Death mark. If the target already carries the Crimson mark, it is immobilized for a brief instant.

Her kit therefore revolves entirely around the drag combo: applying both marks in the right order, then chaining basic attacks and a resource stack during the crowd-control window.

Recommended item build

1. Tough Boots (or Warrior Boots against full physical damage)
2. Hunter Strike (faster rotations + single-target burst)
3. War Axe (hybrid lifesteal + true damage in the early game)
4. Blade of Despair
5. Blade of the Heptaseas against isolated targets, otherwise Malefic Roar
6. Immortality

Emblem: Assassin, with Rupture (or Thrill), Seasoned Hunter and Killing Spree. Battle spell: Retribution with the Ice Retribution blessing.

Key matchups

Hirara devours static tanks: Gloo, Atlas, Baxia and Hanzo show favorable win rates (49 to 55% depending on the sample). Conversely, she struggles against ranged heroes who kite her out of her combo's range — Layla, Cyclops and Odette — and against characters who can match her in a prolonged duel, such as Zilong or Saber.

The drag combo is also her Achilles' heel: getting the mark order wrong burns her kill window and leaves her with neither resource nor ultimate to re-engage the fight.

Sora, the Cloud Boy (2026 meta, released late 2025)

Sora was officially released on December 18, 2025, right at the very end of the year. He is therefore not strictly a 2026 hero, but his meta only stabilized in January-February, once the first patches were rolled out. He is among the most heavily refined picks of early 2026, notably in the MPL and in regional tournaments.

Role and positioning

Sora is a hybrid Fighter / Assassin played in the EXP Lane. His gimmick: an ascension system that lets him, once the ult is activated, switch to Thunder form (assassin: converts 30% of max HP into Physical Attack) or Torrent form (tank: converts attack into HP). Nine skills in total counting both forms.

Recommended item build

1. Tough Boots (Purify blessing)
2. War Axe
3. Hunter Strike (power spike around 8-10 minutes)
4. Brute Force Breastplate
5. Queen's Wings
6. Immortality

Emblem: Fighter, with Vitality, Festival of Blood, and Brave Smite. Battle spell: Flicker (aggressive mode) or Aegis (long survival mode).

Key matchups

Sora preys on squishies with no mobility: Rafaela, Estes, and Guinevere visibly struggle in the side lane. His worst counters are Martis, Phoveus, and Khufra, who punish his dashes or shut down his engage cold before he even reaches his combat form.

What's coming: Collie, hero 134

On Advanced servers for a few weeks now, Collie is the mage 134 expected for the second half of 2026. She's a "kawaii but deadly" mid laner according to early leaks, with a very burst-oriented kit built around combo/proc coordination and short-channelling skills. The exact date hasn't been confirmed by Moonton yet, but a launch in late July or early August 2026 remains likely, in line with the studio's usual pace (one hero every 10 to 14 weeks).

Worth noting: Moonton now systematically shares leaks via the Advance Server 3 to 4 weeks before the Original Server launch — enough time to prepare your picks and emblem before the hero arrives in ranked.

To go further

• Full list of heroes — Mobile Legends Fandom Wiki
• Complete Hirara guide — MLBB Hub
• Marcel guide — Hotspawn
• Official Marcel profile — Esports.gg
• July 2026 leaks — GamingOnPhone

The post-M7 meta thus promises a clear diversification of roles: Marcel rehabilitates the tank/CC support after a long period dominated by enchanters, Hirara revives the technical assassin niche neglected since Novaria, and Sora is durably establishing EXP hybrids in competitive picks. It remains to be seen whether Collie will reshuffle the deck on the mage side — one to watch very closely as M8 approaches.